HONOLULU (April 30, 2013) – The State of Hawai‘i Office of Information Management and Technology (OIMT) today announced the launch of a completely redesigned Hawaii.gov portal landing page, significantly enhancing the consistency and searchability of Hawai‘i government websites. The project to improve online services is part of the state’s Business and Information Technology Transformation Plan released last year.

“The redesign of the state’s web portal is a highly visible sign that our transformation of state government – and how it provides resources and services – is well underway,” Gov. Neil Abercrombie said. “This significant upgrade puts Hawai‘i at the national forefront of website design and integration across all state departments.”

“As just one part of our larger effort to improve state government services, this enhanced landing page provides Hawai‘i citizens with Google-like simplicity for searching state government web pages,” said Sanjeev “Sonny” Bhagowalia, the state’s chief information officer. “Hawaii.gov is not just a portal destination, it is government as a platform.”

Featuring responsive design, the new portal landing page adapts to mobile devices and numerous web browsers without losing functionality. Its “touch-first” design makes it compatible with mobile and tablet devices.

OIMT collaborated with the state’s Internet portal provider, Hawaii Information Consortium LLC (HIC), a wholly owned subsidiary of NIC Inc. (NASDAQ: EGOV), to redesign Hawaii.gov and modernize the department websites as part of the state’s larger web modernization initiative, which launched earlier this year. Like the portal, departments’ websites were revamped and standardized using open source technology, and showcase the cultural heritage of Hawai‘i.

The redesigned portal in conjunction with the modernized department websites provides visitors with easy access to state agencies’ content on desktop computers, laptops, tablets and mobile devices, connects them quickly to the information or services for which they are searching, and conveys Hawaii’s unique sense of place and aloha spirit.

Citizens are able to search without refreshing or reloading the page, and an auto-complete helper allows for suggestions based on real search results to appear as the user types in the input field. The search function uses USA Search, an open-source search service provided and managed by the U.S. General Services Administration’s Office of Citizen Services and Innovative Technologies.

“This project is an excellent example of how we can use technology and expertise from the federal level or from other states to improve our own state services at lower cost,” Bhagowalia added. “By utilizing the federal government’s USA Search product and other open source technology, we can give citizens the functionality they have been looking for without developing the code from scratch.”

“The new Hawai‘i portal goes where no other portals have gone before,” said Russell Castagnaro, general manager of HIC. “It combines a revolutionary touch-first design, service focus, gorgeous look-and-feel, and jaw-dropping performance to make it the best state portal in the nation. Hawaii.gov serves as the basis for the nearly 100 existing online services, as well as many more to come.”